Wow, thanks Morgainelf ! I thought I was a nutjob! Now I know it’s just the writers for Sesame Street who are nutjobs!
Was there an episode about a kid being scared s***less of opening the closet door in the bathroom because she thought her grandmother’s demon cat (which had died years earlier) was in there just…waiting <gulp>? 'Cause that freaked me out, too.
I was petrified of the street cleaner. I ran like hell and hid every time it passed.
I eventually conquered that fear and graduated to skeletons, thanks to catching a late night Sinbad movie with all those skeleton pirates.
Now I’m only afraid of my wife…
You poor little kids!!! Who would have thought such innocuous incidents would scare the hell out of you?
The only thing I can think of is recurring nightmares about tornadoes - spawned from The Wizard of Oz. I would look out my suburban window, and there would be the Kansas plains (instead of the house across the street.) A huge tornado would be on the way to MY house. :: shudder::
I scared of Mr Peanut, the Planter’s mascot.
There was something very sinister about that monocle. And that cane! I was sure he wanted to hit me with it. 
The Pringles guy with the big moustache also gave me the creeps. Even now at 28, I was horrified the first time I saw the recent commercial when he’s singing and all animated.
I was afraid of the basement. Hey, it was dark down there! In fact, I’m still afraid of going into a dark basement.
I was also afraid of the banging noise the pipes in our bathroom made when you took a shower. If you din’t have the water running just at the right force, the pipes would bang when you switched over to the shower, and I thought the whole wall would fall over on me.
And when I was really little, I was afraid of the curtains in my bedroom. When the heat came on, the curtains above the register would billow out, and in the dim light I thought the monsters were coming to get me, so I would scootch over on the bed until I was against the wall… until I realized that the monsters under the bed could slip their long, bony hands up through the gap between the wall and the bed and get me that way. Thank God for Floppy the stuffed dog… he never let those monsters get me ( and yes, he is still in my room, but over on the dresser. The monsters got one of his ears a few years back, but Floppy will not let a little thing like mutilation keep him from protecting me while I sleep.)
Toilets. This made it difficult for my parents to convince me to use them.
I STILL don’t like the ones that go off automatically. The first time I ran into one of THOSE was at DFW when I was thirteen, and I’m sitting there doing what I needed to do and the damn toilet flushes UNDER ME. I just about jumped out of the stall. Last week I was at a restaurant that had automatic ones and since I didn’t know whether they were the timed sort or the ones that go off when you get up, I decided to wait until I got home, instead.
I was afraid of toilets too. I saw part of some movie my mom was watching in her room (from the hallway–I was supposed to be in bed) and it had a scene where someone is in a hot tub or something and someone comes out of it and pulls them in to their death. I think it was some sort of bottomless pit or something.
Anyway after that I just knew that a big hand was going to come up out of the toilet and drag me down to my death. I knew it would happen when I flushed. So I’d get up, wash my hands, open the door, and do this flush-leap-lightswitch-out the door thing, heart pounding, and run to my room.
This kept up until I was about 13.
LOL! Were you reading Poe at an early age?
More Sesame Street:
That bit where Yul Brynner just stared into the camera and counted to ten always scared me spitless.
Also, another vote fo the flying monkeys. Sheesh.
When I was little (4 or 5) I was afraid of paralytic shellfish toxin when we went salmon fishing in Alaska…
I still remember the look on the Fish and Game warden’s face as he tried to explain to me that I didn’t have to worry about it.
To this day my parents still don’t know where I found out about it.
(I’m probably dating myself, but ohwell.)
Remember the TV Show “The Prisoner”? A British spy was sent to an island that was guarded by big white weather balloons? Scared me beyond belief! Luckily the show didn’t last long - was it just one season?
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